


The Caged Rose

by legendofthesevenstars



Category: Tenkuu no Escaflowne | The Vision of Escaflowne
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:35:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27918334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/legendofthesevenstars/pseuds/legendofthesevenstars
Summary: Jajuka tries out for the Zaibach military, but is assigned to take care of a prisoner instead. He develops a unique bond with the prisoner, and after she is taken away, he meets another side of her.
Relationships: Jajuka & Celena Schezar
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	The Caged Rose

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fruitso](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fruitso/gifts).



> This is my Escaflowne Secret Santa 2020 entry. My giftee likes Jajuka and the relationship between Jajuka and Celena/Dilandau. I was really excited to explore their relationship, and write a little Guymelef action, too.
> 
> Happy Holidays, Fruitso! I hope you enjoy this! :-)

Jajuka had passed his Zaibach military physical. His bones and muscles were solid, and he had all his senses. He was the most talented swordsman from his village, and the son of a man who had fought in the last border dispute between Zaibach and its neighbors. Though he had grown up in an isolated beast village and lived most of his life cut off from the modernized capital, he had trained both body and mind for the day that he would join the military and fight for the Empire.

None of that mattered to the Zaibach military, because Jajuka was a beastman.

So instead of being assigned to one of the armies and starting a training regimen, he was given charge of a prisoner. The dark-robed figure told him it was a very important job and the child must be kept alive until the Research Laboratory was ready to examine “it.” He had no idea why the Empire would take a small girl captive. She looked barely five.

This was what he had trained for? Though he had little interest in becoming a hero, it was still disappointing. If nothing else, he’d wanted the security. Though his father had admitted the military would be far from glamorous, he had said he would always be able to eat three meals and sleep in his own bed, and might even be able to live comfortably in the capital once he retired. His caretaker’s salary would be meager compared to a soldier’s, and he wasn’t sure if the meals would be regular, much less taste any good.

Still, until he could prove that he really belonged in one of the four armies, this _was_ his job. And now that the robed figure had left, the girl’s sobs were really starting to grate on his ears.

“Hey, don’t cry,” he said, approaching her tentatively. He hadn’t had so much contact with humans in one day before, and now he was being assigned to _take_ _care_ of one.

“My hair,” the little girl sobbed. “I’m so scared.”

Her hair was above her shoulders, the edges blunt and freshly cut. Curls lay on the floor around her. They had probably been there for at least a day.

“They chopped it off? Why?”

She sniffled. “I don’t know.”

She turned around, and he saw her face for the first time. Her wide, bright blue eyes shimmered with tears. She had a large, pointy nose, large even for a child, and she was pouting, her bottom lip trembling. Her pale blonde bangs, stemming from a distinctive high hairline, flipped outward, brushing her chubby cheeks. The dress they’d put her in was just a piece of cloth, like the tunic they’d given him.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“My name is Jajuka. I’m going to watch over you.”

She blinked owlishly at him. She was adorable, but her bright, yet troubled, eyes were also kind of unnerving.

“You should probably eat,” he said, looking down at the tray the robed man had shoved into his hands. In the bowl was some sort of congealed porridge that looked and smelled burnt. He doubted it was edible, but if the Research Laboratory planned to “examine” her, they had no reason to poison her.

“I’m not hungry.”

“If you don’t eat, I lose my job.” He hadn’t meant to be so blunt, but it was the truth. If she didn’t eat, she’d die. They’d blame it on him, and he’d have no chance of becoming a soldier, let alone getting any further in the capital.

Reluctantly, the girl accepted the tray from him, sitting it on her lap. Though she curled her lip at the first bite, she continued to eat, politely and slowly until two-thirds of the bowl was gone.

“That’s good enough,” he said, taking the tray from her. “I’ll be around at dinner again.”

“Goodbye.”

As he turned to walk out of the cell, he thought to ask the little girl’s name, but decided it would be better if he didn’t know.

—

Jajuka got his own meals, slightly more edible than the girl’s. There was little color or variety in any of the food the Empire served. Rich veterans living in the capital must be eating so much better. The girl told him she’d used to eat much fuller meals, and also that she’d had a wide field to run around in, at home. It was from that same freedom that she’d been taken when she was kidnapped. Now she was both afraid of going outside and afraid she’d never go outside again.

The guard permitted him to take the girl outside into the courtyard, a grassy field with a garden in the center. Though it was fenced in, the girl was overjoyed, crying that it had been so long since she’d seen trees and grass. The same was true for Jajuka. Though Zaibach was relatively barren even outside the industrialized capital, in his hometown he’d at least been able to breathe without feeling like his lungs were clogged by factory smoke.

“Can you climb trees?” the girl asked, looking up at the stumpy, leafless tree near the lake. “The maids never let me. But I always wanted to.”

She walked up to the trunk of the tree and, placing her hands on the trunk, pushed herself up from the grass, planting one foot on the ridges of the bark. Then she reached toward the next thick branch.

“Careful,” Jajuka said.

“I’m being careful!” Her hand slipped, and she fell back onto the soft grass, tumbling onto her bottom. “Oops!”

“Are you all right?”

She blinked her bright blue eyes, then she giggled and got to her feet. “I’m gonna keep trying!”

“All right, but don’t get yourself hurt.”

“Don’t worry, I’m still being careful!” She began another attempt to scale the tree.

Jajuka hesitated only a moment before asking, “What if I lifted you up?”

She looked over her shoulder. “Really? But what about getting down?”

“I’ll help you down, too. I shouldn’t let you get hurt.”

“Okay!” She backed away from the tree. Kneeling to her level, he placed his hands under her arms and lifted her, sitting her down on the branch she had been trying to grasp.

“Now, hold onto the branch,” he said. She placed both hands on the branch, and he let go of her arms, but let his hands hover behind her. “Yes, just like that.”

She giggled, wiggling back and forth. “I’m in the tree! I’m in the tree!” Then she straddled the branch and lay on her stomach. “Now I’m climbing!” She started to climb the branch, scooting toward the end of it, her feet dangling behind her.

Jajuka stayed close to the girl as she clambered between branches, laughing and smiling. Though he’d been worried at first, he couldn’t help smiling himself. He was happy that she could forget she was a prisoner, if only for a moment.

“Let’s pick flowers now!” she said in the middle of climbing higher. “Will you help me down, Jajuka?”

He walked over to her, extending his hand, and helped her jump down and land safely on her feet. She didn’t let go of his hand, and walked right beside him on the way to the garden.

“The flowers are so pretty!” She knelt to the ground, and he bent slightly, first because she wouldn’t let go of his hand, then to kneel next to her. With her free hand, she picked a pink daisy, showing it to him with a smile. “Here!” she chirped, reaching toward his ear and tucking it among his hair. The innocent gesture made his heart twist with warmth and pain. What was the Empire planning to do with a sweet little girl like her?

“One for me,” she said, picking another daisy and tucking it behind her own ear. “Now we match. Oh, look at that!” She pointed at the rosebush next to the carpet of scattered daisies and other weeds.

“You probably shouldn’t pick the roses,” he warned her. “The bushes have thorns. They’re sharp and you could prick your finger.”

“But they’re so pretty,” she whined.

“Sometimes we only want to look at pretty things, not touch them.” He got to his feet again. “You can look, but don’t touch.”

She tugged on his hand, pulling him over to the roses. They stood and looked at the blossoms. The outer shells of their petals were still misty with early morning dew.

Suddenly, the girl hugged his leg. He looked down at her.

“How can a flower hurt you?” she said. The tremor in her voice made his blood run cold. “I know at home I wasn’t supposed to pick every flower, but it wasn’t ’cause any of them would hurt me…” Her bottom lip was quivering. She looked up at Jajuka, meeting his eyes. “Not even the outside is safe here, is it?”

He frowned, but said nothing. What could he possibly say to the poor girl?

“You won’t let me get hurt, will you?” She tugged at the bottom of his tunic. “You told me about the roses. You always bring me food. And you took me outside.” Tears glistened in her eyes. “You’re a good person. You’re not like the rest of them.”

“Of course you’ll be safe with me,” he said. As soon as he said it, he realized it was true. He was the only safe thing she had here, and she was the only thing that made him happy in his current position. He missed Mother and Father, he missed his friends and neighbors, and he missed his own younger sister. Being with the girl brought a simpler time to mind, when he hadn’t had to worry about his well-being or the Empire.

Father had told him that ideals were more important to the Empire than the soldiers themselves, that the soldiers were just a means to their ends. A tiny human girl and a young, talented beast soldier. As different as they were, and despite the kinship growing between them, they were both tools in the Empire’s eyes. Father had always told him how evil the Empire was, and Jajuka was only beginning to understand.

He stooped to her level and looked into her eyes. “I won’t let you get hurt.”

“Celena,” the girl whispered.

“It’s a promise, Celena.”

She screwed up her face, then threw her arms around him. It only lasted a second, and he did not return her embrace.

—

In the end, he was powerless to stop them. But, like an idiot, he resisted.

Being relegated to forever taking care of prisoners had been the least of his worries when the robed men and their soldiers had come for Celena. She’d cried for him, and he’d yelled at them not to take her, but all the same, she’d disappeared.

He was put in charge of a few other prisoners while Celena was in the Research Laboratory. Experiments were top-secret, so he was not allowed to check on her or even ask about her. A week later, a robed man reported the experiment had been a success, but a tentative one. Therefore, the “result” had to be kept separate from Jajuka, in case of recognition leading to the effects wearing off.

A new caretaker replaced him, and he had a second physical and retook his combat exam. Finally, he was allowed to train alongside other new recruits. Now that he had passed the minimum recruitment age of thirteen, it didn’t feel like nearly as much of an accomplishment.

A few years after he began training, he heard gossip of a child prodigy in the Copper Army. The child was barely nine, but he was just as apt as any new recruit. He had wounded his teenage comrades during training and, rather than apologizing, laughed about it. They had put him in a Melef when he was eight, and he’d stomped around cackling, whipping liquid metal around and knocking other Melefs down with his Melef’s fist. They’d had to drag him out of the control chamber.

The Zaibach Empire would never recruit such a young child. There was only one person that child could possibly be. That violent, ruthless child was Celena. He was the killing machine into which they had made her.

When she returned to herself, he was given charge of Celena. Whatever spell they had put on her was not powerful enough to keep her as the other person permanently. No visible marks on her skin carried over from her other self. No bruises, no wounds, no scars. Her skin was as perfect and scarless as the day he had met her, but she was no longer an innocent, happy child.

She seemed half present and half not. But she clearly recognized him. Even as she hit her growth spurts, she continued clinging to him like she had when she was a child. And one time, she screamed in agony as the magic began to take its effect again. They’d dragged her away before he could see what happened, but when he laid down to try and get rest that night, the sound of her shrill wail deepening against her will ripped through his dreams and tore him awake.

She was not powerful enough to resist the spell. He had not been powerful enough to save her.

Seven years after he’d first met Celena, he was taken to meet the young prodigy. His name was Dilandau. Dilandau still wasn’t supposed to know anything about his existence. It was intended to be a training exercise for him, and for Dilandau, who, being nearly official recruitment age now, was in the running for a commanding position and was seeking worthy subordinates.

“A new opponent,” came the taunting croon of his voice. “Let’s see you dodge this!”

He fired all the blades of his Crima Claw at Jajuka’s Guymelef. Solidifying one of his blades into a knife, Jajuka halved the liquid metal, then, stomping forward, aimed for the shoulder of Dilandau’s Guymelef. Dilandau easily pushed his arm away. Then he struck close to Jajuka’s control chamber with the same arm he’d used to fire.

Jajuka spread his feet to regain his balance, then stepped back. He charged at Dilandau’s other arm, just as Dilandau readied another liquid metal whip. A loud smash echoed in the training hall as their arms collided. The liquid metal snaked past the arm of Jajuka’s Guymelef and dented the side of his control chamber. One of his legs folded underneath him, and he steadied himself against the ground with one arm.

Even filtered through his visor, Dilandau’s laugh was shrill and bitter. “Is that all you have?” The red Guymelef loomed over Jajuka, and Dilandau lifted his arm. The components changed, and what came out in place of the Crima Claw looked decidedly more dangerous. Heat began radiating from Dilandau’s raised arm.

He giggled as the flame began building. “They won’t notice a _light_ char.”

Logically, Jajuka should have let the flamethrower scorch the side of his Guymelef. If it went elsewhere when he knocked it away, the building itself could be burnt. But he’d been told not to let Dilandau go too far. Besides, if got seriously injured or worse, he couldn’t be there for Celena.

Finally getting to his feet, he punched the flamethrower, the incoming fire blackening his claw. Gasping indignantly, Dilandau withdrew his arm. The smoky, stinging smell of burnt metal made Jajuka cough.

“How dare you! I should burn you twice for that,” Dilandau sneered, launching a punch directly at Jajuka’s stomach. The punch knocked him back, and he had to spread his legs to retain his balance. Forming the liquid metal in his undamaged arm into a drill, Jajuka straightened up and charged forward. He struck the opposite arm of Dilandau’s Guymelef, denting it so that wires and metal structures were exposed.

“Damn you!” Dilandau snapped. “Take this!” He swapped out the component of his right arm again, forming the liquid metal into a fist.

Then a man shouted, “Enough, Dilandau!”

Jajuka flinched at the voice of the general who’d brought them together. He lowered his arms and waited to see what Dilandau would do.

Dilandau opened his control chamber and jumped out, finally allowing Jajuka to look at him. He was skinny and ghastly pale, but he was the same height and general build as Celena, except that his shoulders were slightly broader, even at his age. Underneath the headband he wore—which, though he was sweating, he didn’t remove—his hairline was strikingly high. His nose was large and pointy, his lips were turned up in an impish smirk, and his piercing red eyes blazed with a vicious, hungry spark.

Was _he_ really the same as the girl who’d picked flowers and climbed trees, and shivered when he’d told her that roses drew blood? Was there anything of him in _her_?

“He fought well,” Dilandau said to the general. “I want to face him again someday.”

Jajuka wanted to open his control chamber, look at Dilandau face-to-face. He knew that Dilandau was not Celena. But he still wanted to protect Celena, who shared this body with Dilandau. Even if Dilandau ever tried to hurt him, he wouldn’t fight back, because he could never bring himself to hurt Celena.

—

The spell remained strong for the next two years. After the start of the war, there was only one time he was called aboard the _Vione_ to look after Celena. The magic had become stronger, so she was largely mute and mostly unaware of her surroundings. Though she was now an adult and nearly as tall as Jajuka, she still clung to his arm and followed him around the courtyard of the _Vione_.

Just like the courtyard in the capital, there was a rosebush. Celena pointed to it, letting go of Jajuka’s hand and running up to it.

“Hold on, Celena,” he said, running up to the bush to try and stop her. But he was too late.

She cried in pain, withdrawing her hand. Her fingers curled inward, gently crushing the rose she had tried to pick from the branch. Frowning, she displayed the palm of her hand, pinching the skin at the tip of her finger so that the blood formed a small bead.

“It’s all right,” Jajuka said. “But remember, roses have thorns.”

Celena looked blankly at him, her lips slightly parted. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes, and she stared emptily at him while they trailed down her cheeks. She clearly felt the pain, but whether the tears arose from the pain or something else was unclear.

Then she raised her right hand, pressing it to her cheek. She trailed the pricked finger down her cheek, leaving a faint streak of red blood.

“No, Celena.” He stepped forward and grabbed her hand. “You shouldn’t mess up your face.”

Celena blinked. Her eyes went wide, and her bottom lip trembled. Then she wailed incoherently, sinking to her knees, and began to cry in agony.

The robed men rushed into the courtyard, lifting Celena by the armpits. Before they dragged her away, Jajuka was horrified to see scar tissue erupting where Celena had trailed her finger down her cheek, the red blood fading from her skin. Had she been trying to tell him about that wound? Or something else altogether? Maybe she’d been trying to tell him she was trapped. Or _he’d_ been trying to tell him the same thing.

Dilandau had sustained deep wounds. Not just the scar on his cheek, but likely many others on his body and his mind. He was suffering, trapped. Jajuka understood that. He’d joined the Empire’s military in pursuit of a better life, but now he had become its servant. But how could he possibly free Celena? Would she even remember, or want, a life outside the Empire?

He was determined now to no longer serve the Empire, but to serve Dilandau. As terrifying as Dilandau was, Dilandau was Celena. Dilandau deserved freedom, too, a life outside his existence as the Empire’s weapon of mass destruction. He would free the rose, and by freeing the rose, help it shed its thorns.


End file.
